Gunman among 7 dead after Fla. hostage standoff

Jul. 27, 2013
|

A woman talks on the phone outside an apartment building at the scene of a fatal shooting in Hialeah, Fla., early Saturday, July 27, 2013. A gunman holding hostages inside the apartment complex killed six people before being shot to death by a SWAT team. / Gaston DeCardenas AP

by Oren Dorell, @OrenDorell, USA TODAY

by Oren Dorell, @OrenDorell, USA TODAY

A hostage situation and mass shooting that ended with seven people dead in the South Florida town of Hialeah began when an elderly couple who managed the apartment complex left the granddaughter they were watching and went to talk to a tenant living with his mother, according to reports.

That act led to a barrage of gunfire that killed the couple, a man walking his children home and three other people apparently going about their business Friday night, according to police. The incident ended when a SWAT team stormed the apartment early Saturday where two hostages were being held by a man suspected of shooting six people.

Police identified the suspect as Pedro Alberto Vargas, 42.

Vargas, who has no known criminal record, set a combustible liquid on fire in his fourth-floor apartment, according to the Associate Press. Building manager Italo Pisciotti, 79, and his wife, Camira Pisciotti, 69, saw smoke and ran to the unit, Lt. Carl Zogby, a spokesman with the Hialeah Police Department told the AP. When the couple arrived, Vargas opened the door and fired 15 to 20 shots, killing both.

Shamira Pisciotti, the couple's daughter, told the Miami Herald that her mother appeared to have died instantly but not her dad.

"It looks like my dad was still alive after he was shot," she said.

Sgt. Eddie Rodriguez told the AP that police got a call around 6:30 p.m. Friday that shots had been fired in a building with dozens of apartments in Hialeah, just a few miles north of Miami.

After gunning down the building managers, Vargas went back into his burning apartment and fired 10 to 20 shots from a 9mm pistol into the street. One of the bullets struck 33-year-old Carlos Javier Gavilanes, who was parking his car after returning home from work. Zogby told the AP his body was found next to his vehicle.

The gunman then kicked his way into a third-floor apartment, where he shot to a man, his wife and their daughter.

Agustin Hernandez and Alberto Martinez told NBC 6 TV that those three victims were their sister-in-law Palis Merlis Niebles, her husband, Patricio, and her teenage daughter Priscilla Perez. Patricio worked as a handyman at the apartment complex, and Niebles was a sister of their wives, Hernandez and Martinez said.

The Pisciottis were Colombian immigrants who managed the building for 20 years and would have celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary in August, the Miami Herald reported. They were watching their 9-year-old granddaughter at the time of the shooting, the girl's father, Carlos Almandoz, told the paper.

"They were terrific grandparents," Almandoz said. "They had an excellent relationship with my children. They took care of them while we worked."

Rodriguez said that when police arrived, they discovered an active shooter situation: "He's inside the building, moving from floor to floor. Eventually he barricades himself in an apartment."

A crisis team was able to briefly establish communication with the man. Rodriguez said negotiators and a SWAT team tried talking with him from the other side of the door of an apartment unit where he was holding two hostages.

But Rodriguez said the talks eventually "just fell apart." Officers stormed the building, fatally shooting the man in an exchange of gunfire.

"They made the decision to go in there and save and rescue the hostages," Rodriguez said. The hostages, identified as Zoeb and Sarrida Nek, were shaken up but not hurt. Rodriguez said he didn't have any information on how long negotiations lasted.

He said police discovered two people, one male and one female, shot to death in the hallway in front of one unit. Three more, a male and two females, were found shot and killed in another apartment on a different floor. Another man who was walking his children into an apartment across the street also was killed. Rodriguez said it wasn't immediately clear whether the gunman took aim at him from an upper-level balcony or if he was hit by a stray bullet.

"From up there, he was able to shoot at people across the street, catching this one man who was just walking into his apartment," Rodriguez said.

All six people were killed in a short time span, Zogby told the AP, and it's possible they were all dead by the time police arrived.

Miriam Valdes, 70, was in a friend's apartment two doors down. She said she heard officers trying to convince Vargas to surrender.

"Pedro let these people out," Valdes said officers told him. "We're going to help you."

She said the gunman first asked for his girlfriend and then his mother but refused to cooperate.

Police and neighbors described Vargas as a quiet man who had only recently moved into the building. However, some tenants said Vargas was abusive and had few friends.

"The crime scene is the whole building," Zogby told the AP. "He was ready to fight."